[johnmeyer]

Movie Studio is expensive? It's $49 retail, less if you shop, have someone in school, or get some other deal. If you have money to pay for an Internet connection, you can pay for this program.

As someone who has been in the software business since 1981, I expect to pay money for good software because programmers, support people, and the rest of the team have to eat. For some types of software there is good stuff that people make available out of the goodness of their hearts, but the really good stuff (like iZotope RX for audio restoration) -- especially for complex activities like a full-fledged NLE -- usually beats the pants off the free stuff.

My final point is one of productivity. If you are doing a single project, then I can fully understand not wanting to pay much. However, if you are doing this for a living, or spending hours of your life working on a few projects, having something that is fully featured, well-supported, and built by a team can save you hours -- and perhaps days -- of time. I own Sony (now Magix) Vegas because it supports scripting of repetitive operations. I have written several hundred small scripts and can, at the push of a button, do work that would have taken me several hours (by doing the same thing to several thousand events in a big five-camera shot).

What is your time worth?